Show Bruc Bru karts charts washington digest boans good government plea ignored by washington press milwaukee Ala mayors criticism of relief ad min ration practices ne neglected lecter as mayor laguardia furnishes Furni usual newspaper copy by WILLIAM BRUCKART service national press washington D C i ASHINGTON it has come to tc washington W be quite a habit for mayors ol of cities and governors of states to tc come rushing to washington tor for ap pe arances before congressional committees commit mit tees they appear as 0 out ut of the blue sky rush to the capitol testify before a committee repair to a ho tel suite and hold a press conference and gain a lot of publicity and go back home they usually come for just one thing money visitations to washington therefore have become fashionable as a political game and if as a result of the words of alleged wisdom dropped from the lips of the self purveyors of peoples thoughts now new checks should be forthcoming from the united states treasury ah they say we got it for you the traffic in mayors and governors especially mayors has grown so heavy that it is seldom news except for the mayors home town and frankly the news writers describe them as being worth about a dime a dozen from a strictly news standpoint I 1 dont mean to neglect the governors when I 1 stress the number of mayors it is a fact that there are more mayors who come hat in hand and a bouquet to toss to themselves later than there are governors it is just like the fact that there are more freshmen in high school than there are graduates from college because hundreds of them drop by the wayside roan hoan flays relief spending those preliminaries ought to explain why the appearance here the other day of mayor daniel W hoan of milwaukee wis failed to get anything like the attention it deserved from the press now mayor hoan is a socialist he is however an individual who thinks about city administration along many practical lines thus differing from the mine run of mayors who are concerned only with reelection election re or a political promotion the mayor came to testify but the mayor in the capital city just to beg for money for milwaukee lie he saw some things around here which he believed were wrong as national policy and he talked about them said the milwaukee mayor in substance you fellows tel lovs are spending a lot of money for relief of the destitute you are wasting a lot of that money and it ought to be stopped it ought to be stopped because you are letting the states and the cities get into the habit of coming to washington for money and more money they are therefore getting out of the habit of justifying to the people of their communities the necessity of expenditures they are making and money their poor are using in other words you ought to make the states and the cities kick in with a greater share for the support of those on relief and force them again to recognize that taxes must be paid for wasted as well as proper use of funds and more important than anything else you ought to put this relief business on a pay as you go basis and stop getting further into debt those were not mayor boans words of course yet I 1 have presented them as substantially what his testimony meant and seldom in recent years have I 1 heard better sense spoken to a committee of congress to me it was almost startling testimony the more so because it was offered while another committee was looking into president Roosevel ts request for 1750 for relief in the next year it should be said just here that mr Roosevel ts appeal for the annual relief appropriation was or appears to be modest that is the amount is modest if it is all he will ask for there are those who expect that he will ask congress next winter for a deficiency appropriation when the projected sum runs out charges states shirk relief responsibilities mayor hoan appeared to believe that some of the states were and are shirking their responsibilities it is so easy to come to washington and tell a congressional committee that our people are destitute and we have no money to care for them aside from the mayors belief it ought to be observed that the mayors and the governors are prone to think only of how much money they can pay out without having to assess their own taxpayers for it they are not to be concerned with federal policy in relief matters and they are all too willing to avoid references to their own responsibility they apparently nave have a new slogan pull uncle sams leg another mayor was around town at the same time that mayor hoan was here he was mayor laguardia of new york nobody seems to know exactly where the little F ower should be catalogued cataloguer catalo gued politically he once was a member of congress as a republican that is he was a republican when he came in but he wandered around into three or four different political parties and seems now to be among the bell of the american labor party anyway th the e new york mayor is a great little testifier fyer in favor getting all ot of the money for new york city that is possible so long as it comes from the federal treasury mayor laguardia is a great favorite among many news correspondents spon dents in washington he is what is called good copy that is to say he always is ready with comment on well on about any subject picture it for yourself if you were a writer and had to have stories for your next edition and yo you found the mayor of a great city willing to talk mayor laguardia will talk plenty aplenty a let there be no misunderstanding about that La Guardias statement politically expedient surely then a casual reader can understand why the comparative statements of mayors of two great cities had the effect on me that I 1 have attempted to report one of them giving consideration to the future of the nation as a whole a statesmanlike examination of a paramount policy the other apparently thinking only of protecting the political hide of himself so I 1 say that mayor boans testimony was almost sensational while mayor laguardia was singing the same old refrain of gamme gim me and I 1 believe thoroughly that the words of the milwaukee mayor will sharpen the wits and stir the courage of those men and women in congress who are seeking an honest solution for the relief p problem problem that is now scarcely less repulsive than a festering sore it was quite by coincidence of course that mayor hoan boans observations should have come about the time that a house subcommittee should have unearthed some evidence concerning uses of money moley that actually stin stinks Irs I 1 do not know about the truth of the evidence but it is a matter of official record now A subcommittee investigator presented statements to the effect that money was used to build lakes in tennessee without reference to the need for recreational facilities considered on any statewide or community basis the statements were attributed to a member of the tennessee fish and game commission and the investigators conc conclusions conclusion lusio ns were that the money had been diverted in this manner in order to increase the value of real estate held by several politicians the investigator and his sources of information named ex senator george L berry and gov prentice cooper of tennessee as holders of land which bene fitted by the built lakes this is the same senator berry who sued the tennessee valley authority for a minion million dollars or so on account of damage claimed to have been done by construction st of one or more of the TVA dams the then member of the united states senate charged that some of his marble quarries were under 50 feet of water as a result of TVA dams move started to publish salaries As a part of this general use and misuse of millions of dollars rep joe martin of massachusetts has started a move to find out how much money is being paid to those who run he has introduced a resolution to have the bea headquarters d here supply the house with a a complete list of salaries paid under you know there have been many charges tossed about concerning the salaries paid out of funds and the lack of work done for them in other words mr martin wants to know some facts why only about 60 cents out of each dollar ever gets down the line to the poor devil out of a job and with a wife and children to feed this action on the part of mr martin seems to link into contentions long made that numerous politicians have placed their pets in top jobs where it if need be they could be quite influential politically mr martin tried to obtain the information about massachusetts but col F C harrington administrator refused to make the facts public ile he contended that disclosure of the salaries would be embarrassing to those wh who 0 receive them mr martin t told old the house however however that federal salaries should always be a matter open to the public and he believed there is no more right to secrecy about salaries than about the salary of the president deAt or a member of congress it will be interesting to see if the house votes the order to make the list public but it will be more interesting to see the amounts of those pay checks released by western newspaper union 0 |